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to do the trick. It isn’t the preference for one’s own experience and belief in people’s character that’s at fault, but the unreflective devotion to these. Dogmatism isn’t bullshit because it cares about the truth. It cares so much, in fact, that it can’t handle not having it. So it insists on having it already without having to work for it. Dogmatism is the Dark Side of Truthiness (I now invite the Colbert Nation to post videos of Stephen battling Dogmatism with his lightsaber on YouTube). And this is what Colbert is getting at with the wishful thinking. It’s wishful thinking that overpowers any other source of information one might accept, so that one is stuck in an ideology, rather than navigating through them.

But wishful thinking need not turn bad. And in some cases it is desirable. Believing that people are generally honest and reasonable is not necessarily supported by evidence. Of course, there are many instances of corruption and idiocy. But there are also many instances of honorable and enlightened acts. By being optimistic without sufficient evidence, good consequences may result. I may suffer incidents of corruption and idiocy with more patience. I may attract other people who are genuinely honest and reasonable to my life. I may very well add a whole lot more light to the world myself. Since our beliefs have implications for our behavior, choosing to believe what we want to be true without knowing that it is true may not always be bad. It can be bad. But it’s not truthiness itself that’s the problem. It’s the manner in which one is truthy.

So I think we can now appreciate that Colbert the satirist is too hard on the truthy elements in all of us. Truthiness exists on a continuum from the nonsensical to the more rational and objective. Truth is the goal of all truthiness, so it isn’t as bad as engaging in mere bullshit, which ignores truth, or purposefully lying, which attempts to subvert it. Moreover, it is a requirement of any life that seeks to establish more than the basic undeniable facts of immediate sense experience, like ‘Stephen sure looks dashing in that painting above his fake fireplace.’

Facts that are complicated and removed from my immediate testing must come to me through external authorities. Ultimately it’s my own experience and ability to think rationally that I rely on to wade through all the lies and bullshit. So, I’m left with a choice of who I trust in public discourse and who I’ll promote to a political platform. With all its potential pitfalls, the path of truthiness is the only way to start your journey, and it won’t always lead you in the wrong direction. And if you want to know my opinion, I’m holding out for the Colbert-Stewart ticket for the next election cycle.

7

Truthiness of the Appearances

ETHAN MILLS

I’ll admit it. The very first time I saw The Colbert Report, I didn’t get it. I was uneasy about this funnier version of what I considered to be insidious ideologues like Bill O’Reilly and Sean Hannity. Sure I was laughing, but I laugh at O’Reilly and Hannity too, even if this laughter leaves a sour taste in my mouth. I chuckled at Stephen’s tomfoolery, all the while wondering what was so funny about the destruction of journalistic integrity and democratic discourse in America.

After watching The Colbert Report a few more times, I “got it,” became one in a long line of “it-getters” and realized Stephen Colbert’s genius. It wasn’t that he was celebrating these negative tendencies, but that he was offering a sophisticated (and hilarious) parody of such tendencies. And parody is often a much more effective critique than the solemn, preachy condemnations offered by boring old media critic eggheads, elitists and the like.

The word “truthiness,” one of Colbert’s better bits of genius, refers to those who “know with their heart” rather than relying on facts and evidence. Much has been written on what truthiness portends for the state of political discourse in the United States. If I’m right, truthiness also constitutes a response to an old philosophical problem